Are You Still Fine? Alicia and Jason series
by deepdiveintoyoureyes
Summary: **ALICIA & JASON** Sequential scenes building (mostly) on canon. Detail & backstory for the AJ relationship. From the first late night at the office, things become more emotionally complicated, and eventually Alicia asks Peter for a divorce. That night she comes home to Jason, and talks to him about her marriage and reveals to him her past with Will. Ends 6 months after END.
1. PERMISSION, CONTROL

_**Summary** : _Detail and back story for Alicia and Jason, in keeping with what we see on screen as best as I can. Let me know in reviews what you like or want to read about!

** I may be biased, but I think Chapter 7 is the best if you only read one. In Chapter 7 (which can be read as a stand-alone), Alicia goes home to Jason after asking Peter for a divorce. She talks to Jason about her marriage, and reveals to him her past with Will. It's an overview of all her romantic relationships in the show as she tries to tie things together and move forward. **

 **Chapter 1: Permission, Control**

 _Jason and Alicia are together for the first time in her office (7x15). After she confronts him for avoiding her calls, they spend the next night together too, at her home, relieving months of tension between them. In different ways, Jason and Alicia both battle to stay in control (smut warning!)_

 **Chapter 2: Midnight, Meditations**

 _In the middle of the night, Jason can't sleep. Holding her while she sleeps and looking around her bedroom, he feels closer to Alicia than ever, but he finds the strength of his desire uncomfortable because she is married._

 **Chapter 3: Exposed, Drowning**

 _Alicia and Jason both struggle with the intensity of their feelings for one another. Alicia wants to give in to her emotions, to give in to Jason, but is scared of how exposed she feels. Jason continues to struggle with her unavailability, and when the two decide to take a shower together he confronts her for the diamond rings on her hand._

 **Chapter 4: Instructions, Power**

 _The lovers attempt to assert themselves over one another. They become more and more uninhibited as they lose themselves in desperate pleasure (shameless smut warning!)_

 **Chapter 5: Ghosts, Lovers**

 _An unexpected reminder of Will gets in the way of Alicia and Jason's evening. Alicia thinks about the two men - their similarities and their differences - and considers her relationships with both Will and Jason. Will she talk to Jason about her past? Jason senses that something is up - will he push her on it?_

 **Chapter 6: Appetites, Attachment**

 _After Jason kisses another woman in a bar, and Alicia's risqué under-the-table antics in 7x17, Alicia continues to live dangerously by being out in public with Jason and raising eyebrows. Their physical relationship gives way to an emotional intimacy that overwhelms both Alicia and Jason as they feel themselves falling, and falling fast._

 **Chapter 7: UNMANNED: Honesty, Hurt**

 _After telling Peter that she wants a divorce (7x18), Alicia comes home to find Jason waiting for her. She tells him about her confrontation with Peter, which begins a long and difficult conversation with Jason about her past. After they discuss her marriage and request for a divorce, Alicia tells Jason about Will. She struggles with her feelings about love, loss, and trust. During the challenging conversation, Jason tries to calm her, tries to listen to her stories, and learn how best to support her._

 **Chapter 8: End, After**

 _Follows Alicia through the days, weeks and months after END. It starts with Alicia, hours after the press conference, sitting on her kitchen floor, drinking alone, and thinking back over the past seven years in her apartment. As time passes, can she look forwards? Will she work out what might make her happy? (Smut warning)._

* * *

"Just listen."

"To what?"

"My breathing."

Her stomach dropped, need aching between her legs. She pressed her thighs together and tried to steady her own breaths to keep pace with his.

As she sat still, eyes closed, all she could think about was how he'd kissed her in her home office, how he'd ran his hands up and down her back as she'd pushed her tongue into his mouth…

Suddenly she felt lips on her own – unsure for just a second whether they were real or imagined – but his gentle fingers tilting her jaw pulled her back to reality and into his kiss.

 _God,_ he was so tender with her, and the need spread from her core up to her abdomen, consuming.

"That's security, they turn the lights off after eleven…"

"Shhh…"

The need burned up past her chest, and tightened her throat.

Her body _screamed_ at her its wants – needs for so long pressed down, denied. Needs that she had tried to alleviate with her own fingertips, and once, with her husband. She had only been able to take off the edge, not fulfill them. Now, she would satisfy them. _He_ would satisfy them.

She climbed hungrily onto his lap, an exhale greedily falling from his mouth. She felt his want hard between her legs and clothes were suddenly obstacles beneath her frantic hands.

On shaking legs she stood to hike her skirt, his hands firm and wanting on her legs.

There were no words, just need, raw and burning, and she moved back to him, knees sinking into the couch as she sunk down onto him.

Now, all she could hear _was_ his breathing, and all she could feel was his length, his hardness, his hands gripping her thighs as she rocked against him, blind and desperate.

He stared up at her, watched this _goddess_ of a woman take all of him in, felt dizzy at the heat and the pressure as she enveloped him, her movements shooting ecstasy through his whole wanting body.

She wove one hand into his hair, holding onto him as she picked up her pace.

She was close already. The embers of desire had been smoldering inside her for weeks, hell, months. When she had asked him for stay to dinner, she had thought that she might sleep with him then and there after a meal of mini-tacos. She had been drunk enough, and god knows, needy enough. But Peter, Ruth, Eli – _other_ people had had _other_ plans, and so she was left alone with her fantasies.

Now his fingers crawled higher up her legs until they traced small, wet circles over her throbbing clit and _fuck,_ "I'm, I'm gonna…" the words gave way to moans as she plunged over the edge and a climax smashed into her like a tidal wave, forceful and blinding, stealing the air from her lungs.

She pressed her mouth to his, vaguely heard his groan and felt its vibration on her lips as he followed her into oblivion, hips bucking up hard and then settling.

Then they were still. She didn't know what to say. Neither did he. The silence was peaceful, calm. She continued to listen to his breathing, the rise and fall of his chest.

"Now what?" she murmured eventually.

"Can I take you home? I mean… give you a ride?"

"Okay."

In the car, he held her hand at stoplights.

Two smokers outside the entrance of her building stopped him from giving her the kiss that he wanted.

"…Are we ok?" she said, tentative.

"Better than ok. Right?"

She smiled, shy almost, wanting something, but she didn't know what. She nodded. "You're still fine?" She asked.

"I'm still fine. I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Yes." She walked out of the car, feeling shaken.

"Hey…" he called quietly out of the inch of open window.

She turned.

"Sleep well. I'll uh, be thinking of you." He smiled, warmth in his eyes.

In bed she passed out and slept more deeply than she had for months.

The next day, his phone rang through to voicemail. Twice.

"Things are complicated between us now?" she asked him later, her voice edged with accusation.

He stared at her. He had come looking for her earlier, but found her office empty. He stood gazing at the couch and licked his lips.

He sat down. " _I want to do that again, but you're married – and to the governor,"_ he had come by to tell her. He tried to get his words out now without being defensive.

"He accepts it… Well, I accept it. And, you kept me from drinking. If you don't come to me tonight, who knows, maybe I'll start drinking again…"

"Way to make me feel guilty…" he grinned, staring into her eyes – remembering the pleading look in them the night before, the desperation, as she had ground her hips into him.

"You want things simple? I want things simple too," she said. "So here it is. _I want you again,"_ she breathed, and jolt of need flashed in his groin. "Don't you want it?"

He leant forwards. "I want it."

"Would you like me to tell you exactly what I want you to do?"

"No. I want you to _show_ me. Your place, 8pm?"

She licked her lips and nodded, leaning back in her chair. He wanted to fuck her right there on the desk.

He walked out and swallowed hard. He looked at his watch. He had three hours to kill.

* * *

As his knuckles rapped on the door, his heart thudded in his chest. Nervousness was unfamiliar to him and he didn't know whether he liked it or not.

She opened the door, a soft cream sweater and black pants. He ran his eyes over her. "Hi," he said, voice hoarse.

"Hi. I'd offer you a drink, but…"

He walked up to her, pressed his mouth against hers. Little moans fell from her throat and he ran a hand up her thigh and then between them.

"Is this what you want?" He asked.

"Yes," she sighed, her knees almost buckling.

He wanted to shatter her into pieces, with every tool at his disposal, wanted to drown her in pleasure. He had seen how she'd been looking at him for months – he could see clearly what was being played out behind her eyes, those beautiful, brooding, dark eyes. He had watched her watch him as they'd worked together, her lips always a little parted like an invitation.

Once she had given him permission, he shoved her with his body back against the hallway wall, hard, rough, and urgent. Her mouth fell open in shock and in want as he took her jaw in his right hand and locked his eyes onto hers.

"Goddamn, you're, you're so goddamn sexy," he growled before his lips were hard on hers. He ran his hands up and down her body, wild and hungry.

She moaned into his mouth.

This was not like last time. Last time had been soft – urgent yes, but gentle, light.

There was something almost threatening in his passion, in how he held and grabbed and moved her, and her stomach dropped wanting him, wanting all of him.

He had her out of her pants and his fingers climbed to where she ached for him. Her breath caught and he paused – a questioning look on his face. She pushed her hips against him in encouragement, in affirmation, and he nodded and pulled the lace aside.

With his middle finger he parted her, and stroked up and down in long, soft strokes while his eyes bore into hers and she fought to breathe. He groaned his arousal feeling her grow wet and silken against him as he slid his fingers back and forth – soft and rhythmic and determined.

She gripped his back and her chest reddened beneath the cream cashmere. He watched her and he throbbed for her and he pressed his groin against her thigh as his hand continued to work. The rough denim of his jeans felt coarse against her exposed skin, and the firm bulge at his crotch pressed hard against her soft thigh – too hard, she thought, hard enough to bruise her - but the sensation rippled along with the pleasure that he was laying into her and her head spun as she started to rock against him.

As her breaths grew shallow and her eyes started to roll back he pulled her roughly from the wall and against his body.

"Let's go," he breathed, stern and demanding.

 _Go where,_ she thought but the words were a million miles away and he silently walked her backwards into the bedroom. She stumbled to keep pace, and she kept her eyes on his face, unsure, compliant.

Then he stopped.

"Take off your clothes," he said, cool and measured and her face burned as she tried to keep her composure.

His words threw her – her mind raced through different responses – but before she could speak she heard his voice again.

"Do as I told you, Alicia."

This time her hands went to her sweater, knowing nothing except that she wanted him.

He watched her undress – his shameless gaze wanton – and she looked back at him, looked lasciviously over _his_ skin as he threw off his own clothes in response. She swallowed hard.

He grabbed her onto the bed.

He was so assertive, so in control; it spoke to the deepest parts of her and lust made her whole body tremble. Truthfully he felt out of control himself; overwhelmed by how much he wanted her. _How many times_ had he imagined exactly this, he wondered, as they had worked in the home office late together, imagined taking her into her bedroom just feet away from where they sat and _fucking_ her, _pleasing_ her. He had wondered what she would look like when he made her come, what she would sound like, how she would taste…

He lay down beside her.

"Show me how you want to be touched," he said, lifting her hand and placing it between her own thighs.

Again his words stunned her to stillness. He challenged her with his gaze, and repeated, voice dropped to a whisper, "Show me, Alicia."

Wordlessly she obeyed, moving her hand over herself and staring into his face.

He watched, attentive, eyes flickering between her face and her fingers. He nodded, brushing her hand away to replace it with his own. He continued to stare at her, watching her buck and moan in response to him, and the intensity of his gaze made her self-conscious for just a moment but quickly her body took over, disinhibited, as she pressed herself into his working fingers while hers grabbed fistfuls of sheets.

He wanted to make her feel so good that she couldn't see, or breathe, or think; so good that her hands tingled and her stomach clenched.

As he watched a crimson flush creep back over her chest and cheeks he pulled his hand away, and when her eyes peeped open he lined their bodies up and waited for her to approve him, which she did with her hungry hands pulling his hips to hers.

Slowly, so slowly, he began to ease himself into the heat of her.

"Holy fuck," he breathed. He stared at her, enthralled by how she pressed her head back into the pillow as her legs fell apart, limp, and she lay ravenously receiving his thrusts just where she wanted them, unable to move but only to _feel_ and to _take._ Desperate, starving _need_ paralyzed her, thighs open, _wanting, just wanting._ He fed her needy body, and they both cursed and groaned and writhed until blistering, agonizing ecstasy claimed their shaking bodies.

* * *

After, he lay back, and she curled against him, head on his chest. He took her hand in his, kissed it, and then held onto it.

She thought about how Peter had left her a voicemail the previous day asking her to attend a donor's event with him. She had emailed him a 'no.' _"You're a selfish bitch,"_ he had yelled, the last time she had missed such a function because she was in bed and couldn't get out of it.

Jason sensed that her mind was far away, and he wanted her there with him, so he breathed into her ear, "God, that was, mmmm, you're sensational." His words brought her back to her body, and he put his mouth on her neck, teeth nipping on fine skin just hard enough for him to feel sure that he was commanding her attention.

The sensation prickled through her and she felt so _wanted._ His heavy breaths made her aware that lust was still pulsing through her.

Jason had awakened something inside her, and even while she came down from the heights of a wrenching climax minutes earlier, she was still wanting. She knew he wouldn't yet be ready again, and she flashed him a glance – eyes glinting - that he didn't yet know how to interpret. Then she felt for his hand, and traced the tips of her fingers over his. Her touch felt electric to him, and when she lightly lifted his hand and carried it back to the heat between her thighs, he groaned " _Alicia"_ like a blessing and a curse.

He took his cue and with his hand he worked again at her soft flesh. She moaned her need and her gratitude, hips moving gently against him.

She smiled to herself – pleased that she had taken what she needed. It was a habit she'd gotten from being with Will. If she wanted more, he'd made her learn, he would always give it to her. If he needed more time, there were other ways, she should know, in which he could – he would – feed her appetite. She didn't have to wait. She should demand. She had spent far too much of her life unaware of that fact.

And appetite she had.

 _"God,"_ Jason breathed, so aroused by her desire. She stared into his face, wondering about him, wondering what he wanted from her, loving the green of his eyes and the soft lines around them. He stared back. He felt impatient to feel her come, as quickly as he could, and so he pushed her to lie flat on her back. Then he placed a hand against the soft part between where her ribs met, pressed hard and flat to hold her still as he put his mouth to her stomach and then lower…

"Jason" she gasped as she felt his control and his skill – he was so quick and firm with his tongue that it gave her shivers, and as her back arched to push herself against him, he suddenly stopped.

"Get up," he said, curt, and it took a moment for the words to filter through her haze of lust and pleasure.

"I... What?" She breathed, dizzy

He knelt up and pulled her brusquely upright. Then _he_ lay back, and as Alicia's eyes narrowed in confusion, she heard his voice.

"Sit on my face," he said, voice low and commanding

Her eyes widened and her groin clenched. He licked his lips and as she started to move to him, he pulled her impatiently into position, putting his hands on her hips to press her down onto his open mouth.

 _"Fuck"_ she cried out, as the hot strokes of his tongue blazed against her. He looked up at her – taking in her beautiful body, her eyes jammed shut and her mouth open in silenced ecstasy. Her knuckles were white as she gripped the headboard.

She pulled her hips a little away from him to lessen the intensity, but he locked his arms over her thighs, preventing her from mitigating the rush of sensation. He was in control, he let her know, with the fast, firm lashes of his tongue that made her whole body quake and tremor.

He held her still and relentlessly fed, fed, fed; stoking a burning fire between her thighs, and when he heard her start fighting for her breath and when her body started violently to shake over him, he pushed only harder with his mouth against her, until she cried out, "Oh my god, oh my _god_ ," and as her whole frame tensed rigid, he closed his eyes to bask in the pleasure of her deep and breathless climax.

As she came down, he still locked her in place with his arms. He eased off with his tongue, knowing she'd be sensitive to the touch. But he couldn't resist sucking her into his mouth. She yelped and twitched, and _fuck_ , he was ready again.

He released his hold on her thighs and flipped her onto her back, pausing just long enough to seek permission in her gratified face, before slamming his length hard and deep into the drenched welcome of her.

His temples pulsed as he fucked her desperately, his hands grabbing blindly and roughly at whatever parts of her they could get a grip on.

She met his thrusts and he drew in a breath, sharp, nearing the edge and surrendering to his own powerlessness as his body bucked into hers almost out of his own control. The speed and depth made her lightheaded and he grabbed one of her arms with each of his hands and pinned them above her head and pumped into her with all he had and it was her low and pleasured moans that took him over the edge and smashed him into pieces as he held her down beneath him.

"God, you're something else," he breathed into her damp neck.

She smiled, spent, now, and so deeply satisfied.

"Are you _still_ fine?" she grinned.


	2. MIDNIGHT, MEDITATIONS

Jason, who was not surprised when he couldn't sleep, traced his fingertips up and down her shoulders as she fell asleep. It took her longer than he had expected, and his eyes moved from her warm little body, to the ceiling, to taking in the details of her private life – her bedroom – as he held her.

He didn't know what she wanted from him, but care throbbed in his chest as he watched her wriggle and stretch. What was that - protectiveness? possessiveness? – he wondered. It was uncomfortable. He took a deep breath, tried to listen to the sound of himself breathing. It was how he'd learned to help himself get to sleep.

In the dark of the room, a gap in the curtain cast in a gentle yellow streak of light and his investigative eye roamed: drawers all neatly closed, photos of her family many years ago. There was one of Alicia as a student too, with a tall guy in a Georgetown hoodie, his arm around her and her face scrunched with laughter. That frame was different than the others though, like she'd bought it at another time.

Being in her bedroom felt about as intimate as sleeping with her had, he thought, and he wondered about all of the things she must have thought about, dreamt about, hoped for, in this bed that he now shared. He guessed that this was her only niche of sanctuary, especially after working from home, and now he was here with her.

He wanted to go rifle through her stuff. He wanted to know more about her, to be closer to her somehow. He had always been attracted to hard women; women with iron wills and sharp tongues, quick wits and loud mouths. Alpha women, by all accounts. Women that didn't _need_ him for anything, but that _wanted_ him, wanted a partnership of equals and wanted him to provide the one thing that they themselves could not provide… Women who, when he gave it to them, would ask, and curse, and grab, and moan.

It was selfish, in a sense. Sure, he wanted to gratify Alicia, but he also wanted to know that he could. He felt gratified himself by giving, by knowing that he could turn her on and crack her code, that he could work out just how to stun her with need and blind her with pleasure.

But there was something else, too, that he didn't know. Some intrigue, some lure, which made affection ache in his chest as he felt the warmth and weight of her body by him. He usually didn't stay this long; he struggled to sleep in the quiet darkness of his own room, let alone in someone else's bed, _let alone_ with someone sleeping in his arms. But his calm and contentment now were undeniable.

"Do you want me to leave?" He had offered earlier. Her eyes had widened for just a snap second before she controlled her face – he had grown used to catching these micro-reactions, to finding her honest answer in the tiny moment before she could steel her gaze.

"Do you… want to leave?" She had said. He smiled at her strategy.

"It's your home, I… I don't want to overstay my welcome."

"You're… very welcome," she had told him, slowly, and he watched her try to figure out what he was thinking as they started at one another.

To his surprise, he didn't want to leave. He wanted to cradle her into him.

"Okay," he had nodded.

Now, as he looked around, the ring on her hand glinted in the beam of light. It frustrated him. _You did just fuck her in her marital bed,_ he reasoned, so now was not the best time for moral one-upmanship. But still, he was irritated by its flashy shine. He had felt the metal of it stark against his face when she had kissed him at LAL the previous night. It had even scratched him as she had tried to reach for the tequila that he'd taken from her hands. He tried to focus again on his breaths, dozing for a short while.

She stirred early, too early, squinting at the 03:32 of the clock beside the bed. She readjusted herself next to him.

"You alright?" she heard him whisper.

"Are you?" she replied.

"Better than alright." He kissed the top of her head, and stroked her face.

Her left arm was on his chest. She lifted her hand and crawled it lower and lower until she heard him inhale sharply and throb under her touch. He burned for her, wanted to push himself inside her, but even more than that he wanted to watch her back arch and hear pleasured moans fall from her tightening throat, wanted to know that he could make her shake with ecstasy, wanted to _provide_ for this woman.

He kissed her mouth, a deep, consuming kiss, and rolled carefully of top of her. His hips moved like they were swimming through syrup, gentle, slow, precise. She shook, she arched, just as he predicted, just as he wanted. It was so languid and yet so passionate.

She held onto him as if she would never let him go, as if she had never needed anyone more. Her fingers pressed into his upper back so hard that it almost hurt, and it turned him on to feel her want for him so strong that she would bruise it into his body with her hands.

In the dark, there was nothing but each other. No sight except mouths to kiss, no sound beyond their heavy, desperate, quivering breaths.


	3. EXPOSED, DROWNING

They lay together and he _wanted_ her. Not physically, but rather he wanted more closeness, more _ownership;_ he wanted to know her, to have her, and he felt like she was keeping him at arm's length.

Unthinkingly, his arms tightened around her, as if clutching her body could somehow meld their minds.

She shuffled, and looked up into his face.

"What?" she asked, quiet.

He shrugged. How did he answer that? _Why are you still married? What do you want from me?_

"I feel a bit restless, I guess," he settled upon. It was 4:20 in the morning.

Alicia's mind raced. _What does he mean, restless? Does he feel trapped here?_ Her own ambivalence was enough for her to handle – the spiraling thoughts about her life, her marriage, her future, which circled viciously over her like vultures – without trying to understand his.

She did want to talk to him, but she was terrified. Terrified of prematurely ending the one source of real, true, selfish joy that she had had in so long; the only thing that had brought her pleasure in such a long time besides the stinging burn and loose ache of liquor. She had felt so lonely, so lost and out of control – had barely realized it herself until Lucca and three loads of laundry drew her out to breaking point.

She wanted Jason – she needed him, in fact, for now. She needed this pleasure, this indulgence, this release. She didn't know what she could offer him longer term, and she was terrified that he wanted something, but terrified that he didn't…

It felt like she was fighting to stay afloat in the warmest and most soothing water, water that was crystal blue and enticing, but laced with dangerous currents.

"You feel restless? Do you want to go somewhere?" she offered, unsure where or what they could do at this hour.

No he didn't want to _go_ somewhere, he thought, a twinge of frustration furrowing his brow. He wanted to talk. Like adults. The him of twenty years ago, before Susannah and before Jillian, would have spat back at her the line she herself had used: "I remember high school, I remember my phonecalls going unanswered." " _I remember high school too,"_ he imagined venomously hurling, " _I remember being too juvenile and foolish to really_ talk _about relationships…"_

But he couldn't push it; he wanted the present so much that he was scared to ask for more, scared to jeopardize what he had now to secure some promises for the future that that he wanted.

He had no idea what she wanted from him; or if she wanted anything at all, for that matter. This was the First goddamn Lady of Illinois. Their marriage was a charade, she had long ago told him, the first time she had invited him in for a drink, all bare shoulders and suggestive smiles. A charade that she claimed was mutually beneficial for both parties, professionally. It was long cold and dead on the personal front, she had explained. So why would the façade end now? Nothing had changed. _Why do you think you are so important to bring down the house of cards?_ he berated himself.

"No. Why don't we…" he paused.

"Why don't we what?" she asked.

"Let's go take a shower," he suggested.

"I… okay," she said, and he headed for the bathroom.

As she followed him, she cringed. She thought how good it would feel to be smothered by water together with him. But her make-up would run, her blow-out would get ruined, she would be so totally _exposed_ around him for the first time…

Make-up had always been armor for Alicia. When she had stayed up all night boxing up Peter's belongings, to cleanse each contaminating trace of him from her home after finding out that he had slept with Kalinda, she had disguised the agony with concealer and eyeliner, as if brushes could blot out the pain as easily as they could hide dark circles and eyes swollen from sobbing. The daily armor made her feel safe, protected, as if she had a shield that could keep her one step away from the world, keep her hidden.

Jason ran the faucet, quickly learning the settings, and stepped into the water, groaning at the heavy heat tumbling down over his tired frame. His moan clenched her groin, and she stood on the bathroom floor running her eyes up and down his body, enjoying every line and shadow.

"Are you just gonna stand there and stare?" he asked, grinning. "I'm feeling a little objectified," he joked.

"I'm coming," she smiled. "I just don't want to get my hair wet, okay?"

He nodded. She joined him, but kept her distance, watching with a little longing as he stood directly under the showerhead, tilting his neck back in pleasure as the water gushed down onto his head and poured down his body. She angled herself stiffly to join him while keeping her face away, to keep her hair, her make-up in tact.

He groaned again and she wanted him, and she wanted to feel the water. But she was afraid.

He held out a hand, and she took it. He pulled her gently toward him and to the stream of water. He pulled slowly enough that she could stop at any moment, but firm enough to say _come here, I want you here._

Alicia inched forwards. Her brain told her to stop, to stay in control, to keep her face protected and her guard up.

But when she met his eyes through the strong stream of water that poured down onto his head and chest, she wanted to drown with him. She imagined diving into a lake or a lagoon – jumping from a rock, or something wild and young and free - and she stepped forward until she felt wet skin against warm, wet skin, and she sighed feeling the heat of the perfect water bear down onto her, soaking her hair and her face, and all she could do was smile and smile and smile.

Facing him, she turned her cheek to rest against his chest. He wrapped his arms around her and they stood together silently as the water ran heavily over them. It felt exquisite.

She closed her eyes at the sensation, listened to his heart beat in his chest, wondered if this all wasn't too much too fast, wondered if he felt trapped by her…

He rested his chin atop her turned head, and the words "I love you" were somehow in his mouth. He choked them back and kept them in but he was bewildered. He didn't think he loved her, not yet anyway, didn't know why that urge had gripped him, didn't know what he was doing holding this woman like they were young lovers, holding this married, unavailable woman like they were under a waterfall on their honeymoon.

Under the water, she felt relaxed, and she touched at his tattoos – she looked and learned these shapes that somehow threatened her in bed, that she had half pretended not to see earlier. But totally naked with him, exposed, now, she wanted to know. She wanted to know everything.

She gently touched her fingertips to a skull on the left side of his chest. Delicately, she turned her wrist and ran the back of her left hand over his marked skin.

He grabbed her arm off of him, quick and startling. Wide eyed she met his glare.

"This _thing_ is sharp, you know," he said, a contemptuous touch to his gaze as it landed on her ring finger.

"Oh, I'm… sorry," she said, almost a question. She pulled her hand back and felt the diamond like a brick, felt it heavy and gaudy and loud.

She felt ashamed, and so exposed, that she almost felt tears start to swell at the reprimand and the ambivalence and at all the ways in which she wished her life were different.

Guilt pooled in the pit of his stomach.

"No it's ok, maybe just use this hand instead?" he smiled. _Fuck, you asshole,_ he cursed at himself. "Come here," he said, pulling her back into him. She wrapped her arms around his back. Behind him, she pushed her thumb into the wedding band, moved it, tried to get her mind off of the treadmill of doubts, hopes, memories and regrets that started up at any mention of her marriage.

"Water feels good, huh?" he said, a little timid.

"Water feels good." She said, and she tipped up her face so that the stream crashed over it, hard and warm and blissful. She couldn't breathe, but for a moment she allowed herself to enjoy that fact, enjoy the powerlessness as he held her against him and she felt like she was drowning in the water and the heat and in his arms.

She stepped out of the shower and wiped her face on a towel. As Jason followed her out, she had never felt more naked, more exposed, with him.

He walked to her and took her face in his hands, running his thumbs over the soft freckles that he had never before seen, freckles that peppered the rounds of her cheeks, flushed pink from the heat of the shower. Her eyes shone.

"You are _so_ beautiful."

She smiled, a little self-aware, and fought the urge to crane her neck to see her reflection in the mirror, to see what he was seeing, wet hair flat and face scrubbed clean.

"And I, I didn't mean to snap, before," he said. "I… I'm sorry for being brash. I just don't like not knowing what the situation is. But I'm sorry."

"It's okay," she said genuinely. "The… situation, is… well, it's… it's… you know."

"I know," he nodded.

He knew that he didn't know, and he knew that she didn't know. But they were both going to tread water today, and tomorrow, and hopefully the next day and the day after that.

They were both caught up in currents much stronger than themselves, and being carried so powerlessly along felt thrilling, soothing, dangerous.

They crawled back into bed with one another and lay back in the dark, both struggling to stay afloat, and neither one of them sure whether drowning in this sea would be an awful or a beautiful thing.


	4. INSTRUCTIONS, POWER

It took her a while to get used to the way that he gave her instructions _. Sit there_ , he'd say, nodding to the edge of the bed. Naked, she would sit. Open your legs, he would say, and her cheeks and her groin would burn.

One Thursday, alone in the apartment, she strode boldly to him and pinned him against the wall. The heat of her want had been bothering her all morning.

After their clothes were long gone and hands and mouths were greedily roaming, he pulled apart from her.

"Get on your knees," he said, and it took everything she had to keep her face set and gaze steady – her mouth tried to fall open in disbelief, and her eyebrows tried to knot together.

 _You can't be serious,_ she thought. But she kept her expression cool and disaffected while she decided how to respond. She stared at his face and didn't move.

Her ears rang – an intoxicating cocktail of anger, intrigue and dizzy lust.

She had learned from being with Will what it meant to throw off inhibition in the raw and rampant pursuit of pleasure. Her need for him, and for what he did to her, had made her skip appointments and cancel meetings; once she'd even canceled on a client already in LG's waiting room, she had had to climb down 27 flights of stairs, heels in hand, to escape unseen. She ran out of the building, panting with exertion and desire, and into the hotel room that he'd booked them minutes earlier, ran into his arms, into hedonism, into shaking and tingling pleasure.

She wanted to kneel down before Jason, and the realization startled her. She didn't _want_ to want to. She could be submissive, sure, had been for most of a marriage that she had truly found gratifying. Peter had swept her off her feet that way, so confident, so appealing in his rugged alpha dominance. Will had to be coaxed into being rougher, to stop treating her like a hallowed thing, and allow her to feel the full force of his need for her.

But power for its own sake; she didn't know what to make of that.

He stared back at her, wordless, waiting and _god_ how was he so confident? She swallowed.

He read her like an open book and it put her on edge. He had a way of looking, a _knowing_ way of looking at her that had made her feel naked around him since the first time they'd met, since he'd shaken her left hand and laughed as he kicked up a storm inside her.

Eyes locked on his, and with the briefest purse of her lips that gave away the flurry of thought, she lowered herself slowly to kneel on the carpet.

His lips curled up at the edges and her cheeks and chest flushed a hot dark red, betraying her practiced nonchalance.

She didn't know what to do with her hands, down on her knees, on the floor. She wanted to cover herself, cover her nakedness before him, but she pressed them hard into the sides of her thighs, trying to keep control and keep dignified.

Her body ached with want while her head span with confusion.

As she looked up at him, she wondered what her limits would be. What would be too much? Would he know?

He walked to her, a prowl, animal in its expectant intensity, and he stood over her gazing back down at her wide eyes. His eyes – smoldering dark with desire – stared down at her as he softly pushed his hands into her hair. She opened her mouth, ready for him and wanting him, but he pulled on her hair to tip her head back and away.

Her eyes widened at the flood of sensation prickling her scalp, and then they narrowed – unsure – as Jason dropped down to _his_ knees facing her.

He moved all the way down onto the floor, turning to lie on his back and burrowing his face between her kneeling thighs. As he moved his head beneath her, she almost laughed, but then he pulled her hips down onto his face and his mouth was on her and instead she cried out in anguished ecstasy.

* * *

One day she thought _fuck it, my turn. I can give instructions, too._

He walked in to her bedroom and closed the door. "Stay right there," she commanded him. He raised his eyebrows and smiled, bemused almost, but she was deadly serious.

She stripped and stood in front of him. His eyes ran hungrily over her body. He needed to touch her.

"Make me come," she said and the words echoed, like a foreign language to her. She couldn't believe herself, and it she found it thrilling, heady.

His groin clenched hearing her words and he walked to her.

"Yes," he breathed and he pressed his mouth onto her throat feeling her skin under his hands. His erection strained painfully against his tightening pants.

"What do you want, Alicia? You want my fingers? My mouth?" he raised an eyebrow.

She stared into his face.

"Yes," she said, her smile wicked and her face wanton and he groaned for her and he fell to his knees and he served her.

She wanted to be pleasured. She was older now, and secure in that want – not just for the orgasm but to have undivided attention lavished upon her body. As he carried her to a clenching climax, she grinned, gratified and self-assured.

Then she pushed him onto his back on the bed, his hardness blatant, a plea.

He tried to flip her onto her back, tried to wrestle back the control that he was accustomed to.

"Oh, no," she shook her head, She was in charge. His burning stiffness throbbed heavily.

She wrapped her warm mouth around him, watching his neck strain as he grimaced in ecstasy.

"Fuck," he moaned, pressing his head back into the pillow and gritting his teeth.

He couldn't take it, the pleasure she was shocking him with, the powerlessness.

She smiled. Control could be fun.


	5. GHOSTS, LOVERS

"Could you pass me some socks?" she asked one night as he walked back into the bedroom with a glass of water. He had been sleeping over at her apartment several nights per week since their first decadent weekend, and she liked how familiar his presence was starting to feel.

She was scared to admit it, but she was getting invested. They had a routine worked out too, so that they never entered the building within 20 minutes of each other.

"Socks?"

"They're in the top drawer," she said, stretched out on her bed.

He grinned at her, lying lazily and indulgently naked, and adoration rippled through his chest.

"Why, are you getting cold feet?" he mused through a mischievous smile.

"Very funny," she countered. "Why don't you get back in here so I can show you all the second thoughts I'm not having…"

He ran his eyes over her body and licked his lips. She smiled back at him as he walked to the dresser.

"What's this?" he asked as his fingers brushed against glossy paper through the fabric of the socks. "Is this your idea of a dirty magazine? Chicago's most eligible bachelors?" he drawled, amused.

"Oh," she laughed, trying to cover up a scorching flash of shame and a bitter punch of grief. "I forgot I still had that," she lied. "A friend was in it."

"Who?"

"Just an old work colleague. Another life ago. You don't know him."

He squinted at her. He knew her well now, knew from the sharpness in her tone and the tremor that ran beneath it that she was covering something. Plus, the investigator in him knew that nobody could forget about the contents of a drawer that they used every day.

He closed the drawer.

"Okay," he said, tossing her a pair, soft grey cotton.

* * *

Later, as Jason moved in her, fingers entwined with hers, sweat slicking both of their panting chests, he put his mouth on her neck. Higher than he usually did, lips pressed almost to the back of her ear – a place he had never kissed before but that was shockingly, achingly familiar.

"Will…" she breathed. It was an instinct, a reflex, nothing else. She cursed herself – she really _hadn't_ been thinking of him in that moment and it was nothing but habit that had innocently forced out his name.

"Huh?" Jason asked, husky.

"Will you kiss me?" she tried, scrambling to neutralize her voice.

Jason brought his mouth over hers and she moaned into it, and bucked her hips up into his. She didn't know if he had registered anything at all, and so she played normal and kissed him and held onto his loving hands and tried to surrender…

In the end, he couldn't make her come, and he narrowed his eyes, slowly nodded at her protestations that he had worn her out that morning. She lay on his chest, drawing her fingers softly up and down his skin as he stroked her back.

She looked at the dresser, at the drawer, remembered sitting on the edge of this very bed years ago with that magazine in her hands, remembered how she had fought with herself about Will, how she had raged at her own desire, felt betrayed by the wanting and how nothing could make it stop…

 _"_ _Whatever you think you could have changed in your life or in his, you couldn't have."_ She recalled Ruth's Iowa homily, words that had proven surprisingly soothing in the past few months as she worked to close once more the door that Eli's voicemail revelation had thrown open.

She sighed.

In response, Jason kissed her in his own way, a gentle press of his lips before he rubbed his cheek gently and lovingly against her head.

They were so different, Jason and Will. They were similarly savage in the speed of their wit, though, and so alike in how a warm openness lay in wait beneath a guarded exterior – an openness that felt like a gift, to her, once she had it. But they were so unalike in so many ways, in demeanor and disposition, in humor, and she smiled sometimes wondering what they would have thought of one another.

For all of their differences, the feeling - like she was standing on the edge of something, that things were flying free from her control - was the same. The feeling of fear and of longing – that unique and intoxicating cocktail – now that was familiar.

Well, not exactly. She felt older now, more entitled, less _wedded_ , in every sense of the word, to her husband and to the farce of it all. With Will she had caged her thoughts, her hopes, stopped her mind from wandering over possibilities, or partnership, so scared had she been of the strength of her want for him. But she had learned the hard way - the hardest way of all, she thought bitterly - that her fear had robbed her of even an imagined future with Will.

So now she did, sometimes, dare defiantly to daydream about something with this man who held her tonight. She had even started taking off her rings sometimes, an experiment, bold, heady.

"Jason," she said, slowly.

"Yes ma'am."

"Jason Crouse."

"That's me…" he murmured.

"I'm glad you're here," she breathed, a whisper.

He raised his eyebrows, a little smile on his mouth until she kissed it away, kissed his lips and cheeks and forehead in turn before burrowing back down and nestling onto his chest. He looked at the top of her head, bemused, but wanting for nothing.


	6. APPETITES, ATTACHMENT

HE TOOK her out to dinner.

It was voyeuristic, being out with him in public, and thrill ran like a current under her skin. They had started out so careful, vigilant, but at some point she had stopped caring, started enjoying the adrenaline.

A few days earlier she had undone his belt and wrapped a hand tight around him while they sat at a table as Lucca went to the bar.

" _You are a constant source of surprise,"_ he had breathed, straining, but he wondered what she was really trying to do. Was it possessive, after their misunderstanding about him kissing Rosie? Had she just never lived this life, of youthful recklessness? Or was she courting calamity – did she want, somehow with some small part of her, to be seen, want some undeniable ticket out of her marriage, like the headline she had breathily whispered into his ear while she touched him?

Although this restaurant felt more private than the bar, it still thrilled her to be out with him. He liked it too – liked being _normal,_ with her, simple. This type of thing was part of what he had meant when he had totally opened himself up to her, when he had asked, _"What if I'm jealous of your husband?"_

She didn't know how much it had taken for him to say that out loud.

 _"Don't be…"_ she had murmured, and he had looked into her eyes wanting something more – wanting an ' _I'm yours,'_ or a ' _You're all I want' –_ wanting her to promise, to prove it.

" _Okay,"_ he had said, but he was as jealous as all hell. It was always there, like a dull ache.

He felt it every time they went somewhere together and he couldn't proudly hold her hand, every time he went somewhere alone and wanted her company – wanted it to be perpetual, unthinking. Sure, he wanted to take her places, show her off. But he didn't just want to have her, he wanted to love her. Wanted to crawl into bed with her each and every day, wanted to drag her beneath him, wanted it to be his job, his duty, to please her.

There was a way that her face lit up when she smiled, and he wanted always to see that light, wanted to work out how he could keep it shining and wanted to fill her with contentment, and ease. Yes, he was jealous.

"Here's our dessert menu if either of you can be tempted," a waitress said, snapping him out of his thoughts.

She walked away, and Jason raised an eyebrow over the table.

"Oh no, I can't," Alicia replied.

"Alright," he smiled. "Well, for next time I'm here, which of those sounds the best to you?"

"The flourless chocolate tart," she smiled – that light again - and her eyes said "obviously."

"Excuse me Miss, we'll take one chocolate tart, two spoons," Jason said, catching the waitress' attention.

"Absolutely, sir. Vanilla or chocolate ice cream with that?"

"Alicia?"

"I... vanilla." She said.

It was a decadent thing, warm, rich and gooey and his eyes followed the spoon to her mouth and he licked his lips at the sensuality of watching her lips and tongue consume it.

As she closed her eyes in pleasure and moaned, barely loud enough for him to hear, he swallowed hard.

"Are you alright, Mr Crouse?"

She licked the back of the spoon slowly, eyes glinting with mischief.

"Don't think I'm going to let you get away with that," he said firmly.

"Is that a threat?" she said, coy, and he wanted to pin her against the wall.

"It's a promise," he said, gaze set steely on hers.

"Oh really?" she breathed, slipping out of her heels, and he felt her foot run up the inner seam of his pants under the tablecloth.

He shifted in his seat, unsure what to make of this risqué move from her, the second in a few days, the second in public.

He looked around them – moving only his eyes and not his head. The tablecloth was pretty concealing but… _god_ her foot settled between his thighs and he stared into her eyes.

"Stop it Alicia," he said, tortured, as he started to harden and ache.

She smiled at him, licking more ice cream from the spoon.

"Are you sure that's what you want?" she said, lilting. "It doesn't _feel_ like that's what you want…" she said, dragging her foot up and down his stiffness.

He gripped the table. He was rock hard and light-headed with lust.

He stared back at her, eyes foraging for skin to feast on. Her top was high-necked but her hair was brushed back and he imagined biting down onto the side of her neck as he pushed himself inside of her.

She smiled, gratified at his response to her.

"Here's the check, when you're ready," the waitress said.

Alicia dropped her foot and Jason grabbed the check, happy to have something to distract him from the painful need she had stirred up.

"Can we split it?" she offered.

"I got it," he said pressing down cash peeled from a wad in his jacket.

"Shall we get out of here?"

"I uh, need a minute," he conceded, and she almost laughed out loud.

* * *

A few minutes later they climbed into a taxi, happy and giddy with the ease of the evening and anticipation for what they would soon do with each other…

"Oh Mrs Florrick, please excuse me for interrupting," the taxi driver said, looking back at them in the mirror. "What an honor, I'm a big fan of your husband…"

"Oh, thank you," she said. "That's kind of you." She turned to Jason without missing a beat, and said a little too loudly, "So I think we'll have a problem with Judge Parks. I think we've got a good jury, though the foreman might give us some problems…"

He didn't flinch at her ad lib.

"Sure. Well, we'll see what we can get done in pre-trial motions. It's this Tuesday?"

"It is," she said, enjoying this fantasy case and their synchrony. The white lie made it feel like it was them against the world. The driver pulled up to her house, curiosity flashing through his eyes.

Jason jumped in. "Well, good night Mrs Florrick," he said and she was incredulous, mind scrambling for a next step… "Oh you know what," he added, before she could think, "I left the Haynes files up there in the office. I better grab them before the deposition tomorrow."

The driver nodded, appeased.

Alicia could barely keep from laughing as they waited for the elevator.

As they rode up to 9, she put her hand brazenly on his crotch and stared blankly into his face. She couldn't believe herself, sometimes, but she liked it. " _No one knows 'who they are,""_ Lucca had told her, and she guessed now that maybe that was true.

He moaned as his blood rushed back to where her hand was, causing the burning, heavy ache to return to his groin while he looked back into the challenge of her gaze.

The elevator doors opened, and her fingers fumbled over her keys while he pressed his erection into her back, desperate for the hot warmth of her to relieve the throbbing pressure between his thighs.

She clicked the front door closed gently behind them and held up a finger.

"Grace?" she called out gently. Nothing.

"I'm just gonna check." He nodded as she walked over and peeped into the room. Grace was fast asleep. "I love you," Alicia mouthed silently into the dark before closing the door.

Jason was waiting in her bedroom. As soon as she walked in, he grabbed her and pressed her against the closed door with all of his body weight.

His tongue burrowed into her mouth as his hands cleared a rough pathway through only the necessary clothes – lifting her skirt and dropping his pants - and she guided her into him still standing against the door.

" _Fuck,_ " he breathed at the sweet relief of her finally wrapped around his pulsing need. "Oh fuck," he moaned through gritted teeth and she was so turned on by his desperation, by his frantic, ravenous need that matched her own.

Years ago, she had stood for months in this room picking herself apart; stood in front of the mirror, eyes like blades as they worked over her own reflection. Comparing herself to _the other women_ ; despised the lines she had where they were smooth; resented her softness where they were firm, her straightness where they were curved… She had hated herself and she had hated Peter for making her do this to herself but she couldn't stop. She felt like everyone else was doing the same, too, when she walked down the street and pitying eyes ran over her, thinking the same things, she imagined.

"I can't get enough of you," Jason said, pounding into her body, and she felt so empowered by his desire, and so overwhelmed by her own.

It wasn't want. Yes, she wanted him, but right now it was need. Raw, greedy, need.

"Shhh," he whispered, "You'll be heard," he scolded as she groaned and whimpered as his thrusts made her cry out.

"I don't c…" she tried, but she couldn't finish the sentence. She did care, so she tried to be silent while she gasped for him as desperately as she did for air. She needed the release of what he was building up inside her, so thoughtful, so deliberate.

She loved how assertive he was. As he fucked her, one hand was slipped between them, rubbing relentless circles over her, and the other hand was in her hair, scruffing her head back like a kitten.

His teeth nipped onto her collarbones, the waves of pleasure stopping just short of pain, like he just _knew._ She felt like prey in his hands, the way he held her still to pleasure her, and the powerlessness and the ecstasy made her legs shake.

The singularity of focus was unlike any other moment of her day. Usually she worried about a few things at once, but now she was blind, driven by the animal need inside her, hips moving of their own accord and rhythm, pursuing for her body that drowning joy that he was laying into her.

"Don't stop," she begged. "Harder," she demanded.

He obliged and her legs felt weak as he gave her everything that he had.

He made her uninhibited. He had done something to her, beckoned something out. Something raw, uncontrolled, and most terrifying of all, she felt, uncontrollable.

It felt like falling, and as she felt herself get close, she wrapped her arms around his neck in case her knees gave way, and his hips crashed into hers over and over and over until he ignited a white hot pleasure that shot blindingly through her body, and the contractions of her climax smashed him into pieces too and they came together, gripping wildly onto one another, panting and sweating and shaking and breathless and _satisfied._

"You're spectacular, fuck," he moaned, coming down.

"Jason…" she said, startled by the attachment that ached in her chest. She had planned to stay guarded, especially since she saw him with that woman at Avenue Tavern, all legs and long blond hair just like Amber, she had thought as bitterness burned in her throat.

He had apologized the next day, voice wavering. She told him that he didn't have to explain, told him he didn't need a ticket through her door, and he had abandoned his planned words and kissed her, just as she'd asked.

But then he had walked her into the bedroom, and as she pulled off her sweater he had held her bare shoulders still, and said, "Alicia, it really wasn't what it looked like, and I'm so sorry that you saw that and for what you must have thought."

"It's ok…"

"No, it's not," he had said.

Now, they stood joined together exactly on the spot where they had had that conversation – and despite her intentions, her plans, to keep up her guard, she felt like she never wanted him to move from her; she wanted to hold him, wanted him to hold her.

He kissed her mouth, slowly, causing her to growl in approval. She put a hand softly on his cheek and he pressed his face into her, gaze full of an intimacy that she hungered for while it terrified her. She moved her fingers tenderly to his lips, and he kissed at each of her fingertips while her heart raced with affection and want and fear.

She didn't dare speak.

They stood, joined together, and finally and gently undressed each other, only now feeling the heat of each other's body against their own. Naked now, and unguarded, they touched and kissed at one another's faces, light and adoring and it felt like falling.


	7. UNMANNED: HONESTY, HURT

_I know you've been hurt by someone else._

 _I can tell by the way you carry yourself._

 _If you let me, here's what I'll do._

 _I'll take care of you._

 _..._

 _Pushing me away so I give her space_

 _Dealing with a heart that I didn't break_

 _I'll be there for you, I will care for you_

 _I keep thinking you just don't know_

* * *

"I told him I want a divorce."

"What?"

Alicia didn't speak. Neither did Jason.

They were together, tangled in bed, and they both stared up at the ceiling. An hour earlier she had come home from work, unsure whether Jason would be there waiting for her after their conversation that day.

" _Look, Alicia… I like you. I like you a lot…"_ he had started, and her throat had tightened.

" _Seriously?"_ she had cut him off.

In the conference room she had scrambled, the fear of rejection and shame – that all too familiar ache – pooling in her stomach.

She had tried to play it off, told him, " _I don't want your spirit, I want your body;"_ told him " _I want to use you and I want you to use me;"_ thought that if it was nothing more than sex then he couldn't reject her, she couldn't be refused, unwanted, unchosen.

Not again. It had never stopped hurting – Amber, Kalinda, Ramona – it had never stopped, and she had felt it a week earlier when she saw Jason thread his fingers into blonde hair and press his mouth onto someone else's…

She was terrified of that ache, that ' _you're not enough for me'_ feeling, and the fear of it made her try to make herself unrejectable. " _It's purely sexual,"_ she had breathed, hoping that would mean _this isn't anything, this isn't serious, I can't get hurt here._

Her words had stung Jason, more than he felt comfortable admitting, even to himself. That afternoon he had sat around, using all of his professional skills to decode her – to try to square her words " _it's sexual…" "I'm not under the illusion that we committed to one another…" "I don't need a profession of faith…"_ with her actions – the way she _was_ with him, how loving, how intimate. It made him doubt himself, and he hated it.

And now this? She had told her husband that she wanted a _divorce?_

"You told him...? Uh… when?" he asked.

"This afternoon." She said, coiling in on herself and he felt her closing up like a fist.

"What did he say?" Jason tried. He knew he had to keep her talking – knew that if she stopped she wouldn't start again.

Alicia sighed. "Not much."

After she had confronted Peter – all snark and edges – she had gone straight to court, then straight to LAL, and only now, did she have a moment to think. Only now, lying in bed - this bed that had been _their_ bed, this bed in which their babies had slept with them almost two decades ago – could it really sink in. The realization seeped into her like water into cloth. She felt light headed.

Jason looked at her and knew she was somewhere else.

She was.

" _It must be true love. Again."_ Peter had said, words like a razor blade to scar tissue. He was trying to wound.

It worked – she saw Presidential Suites and New York City balconies - but she didn't let him know that he'd made impact. She kept her gaze hard and her face set.

 _"Is that what would upset you most? If I was in love?"_ she had hit back, and her eyes said 'you are pathetic' and it hurt him just like she wanted it to.

"Alicia…" Jason said, snapping her from her memories. "Do you wanna talk about it?"

"No." She squirmed inside. She tried to damp down the chaos and trauma that threatened to stab through her like the venom of a disturbed snake. _Everything_ about Peter, about the marriage, from the first betrayals that had gone unprocessed, unforgiven, was storming through her mind now.

"Well, I'd like you to," he said, a question and a demand.

She stared back at Jason. He hated when she did that. She felt angry at the question, didn't recognize in herself that it was really fear, fear of what was in there when she went digging. She felt a knot of heavy feelings weighing in her stomach.

"Peter asked if it was about you…" Alicia said, and Jason's heart raced in his chest so hard that he thought she must be able to hear it.

 _…Is it?_ He was desperate to ask, desperate to know. He bit the inside of his mouth to keep silent – usually it was easy for him to keep words in, but these ones he had to swallow down hard. She started talking again.

"It's not, about you, before you run for the hills," she said, sharp and cold and he didn't know why. "I just… the _audacity_ of him to ask…. As if there aren't a million other… After what he…" she trailed off.

"After what he…?" Jason encouraged, voice barely a whisper. _Keep her talking,_ he thought.

"It's not like you don't know, Jason. The whole world goddamn knows," she snapped at him. Fury blazed in her chest so hard that she had to sit up. She remembered how people had looked at her, how her face was on screens and in magazines, remembered the pity, the laughter, the shame.

Now though, it was rage. Pure, searing, red rage, and it was for everything.

Everything that her twenty-four year old self had wanted, everything that she had given to Peter, remembered his boyish smile as he had made vows to her and even the warmth of his hands as he took hers, cold and shaky, to slide a platinum band onto her, ownership, commitment.

She sat up, breathing hard and heavy, wracked with a suffocating haze of anger and grief. She realized, perhaps for the first time, just how little she had accepted any of what he had done, of what had been lost, probably never would.

Jason lay still, staring at her turned back as she perched on the edge of the bed, and waited for her breathing to settle.

A minute later, she turned back to him. Her eyes were softer.

"I'm going to get a glass of water," she said, pulling on a robe and darting out of the door.

She often ran, under strain, he had noticed, even just to the next room. He didn't want to push, didn't want to hurt her, but he knew that this was too important for her not to talk about, to explain. After the intensity of their time together recently, he felt that he was owed something, some acknowledgment, some conversation.

He pulled on his robe and walked out into the kitchen.

* * *

She was standing, leaning against the island, body language tight and numb.

He poured out two glasses of water.

"Alicia, come and sit with me," he said, walking to the couch, and she was too exhausted to challenge. She followed.

"Talk to me," he murmured.

She stared into his face. He sighed.

"I don't mean talk about…. I mean, are you alright?"

Again, nothing. He changed tact.

"Ok. I know that what you did was not _about_ me, but does it… affect us?"

"Does what affect us? The fact that I told my husband I want a divorce or the fact that my husband fucked around for years and shamed and humiliated me and my children?" she bit.

He thought for a moment. "Whatever you feel - … Do you want to start at the beginning?"

"The beginning? You want me to talk about what it felt like when the media ran footage of my husband in bed with a _prostitute?"_ She spat the word out, spat the whole sentence out, and he didn't know if the anger was at Peter or at him but he was too far gone now to let this drop. He had never seen her this like – angry, candid, raw - and there was something important to be said, he knew.

"What I mean is…" Jason said, softly, taking one of her hands between his, half afraid that she would bolt out the door, in her robe. "You've been hurt. Hurt by someone who said that they cared for you and wanted to commit to you. Now, as somebody sitting here saying those same things, I think it would be good if we could discuss how…"

She pulled her hand back, not hearing all of what he said, not hearing the gesture in it, the commitment. "Are you asking if I'm damaged and paranoid?" she snapped. Accusation glinted in the steel of her eyes.

"No. I'm not." He said, slow and measured and making no sudden movements. He thought for a moment. "When I was a kid, my dog, Joey," he smiled, "got hit by a car. My next puppy, Dexter, well I couldn't let him off his leash. Ever. I think that dog must have hated…"

"It certainly _sounds_ like you're asking if I'm damaged and paranoid." The knot of unprocessed pain climbed from her abdomen up into her chest and her heart raced as she tried to keep it down.

"Alicia," he said, taking her hand again. "I'm not insinuating. I care about you, and that means I want to know what I can do, to…" She had to make him stop talking.

"You're not the only… this is not my first… first… since… everything happened." Her words fell like stones into water. He didn't move, waiting for the waves to settle. While he sat still, he wondered who, and how many, and he was bemused to find himself a little jealous.

"Okay," he said, relenting. "I'm sorry." Her body softened. "I didn't mean to drag things up. I… I've never been hurt like that, in love, you know, and it was insensitive to ask." She stared at him feeling like he could read the very depths of her mind as her pulse calmed and the panic receded.

She nodded, accepting his apology. "It… it was such a long time ago but it's… it's not easy to talk about. When I found out, I…" she swallowed, "I remember just standing there, at the _cleaners_ of all places, and my… my whole world… just…just…"

She looked to him like she was in physical pain. "I can't. Not right now," she stammered.

He nodded, taking that as progress. "Ok sweetie, it's ok." He kissed her hand. "It's alright. I shouldn't have asked like that. I'm sorry. I wouldn't wanna talk about the worst day of my life, either."

She pursed her lips.

He pulled her chest to his, to embrace and soothe her. With her head on his shoulder, she whispered,

"It was the second."

"What?" he murmured.

"Nothing," she said, pulling herself more tightly into his arms.

* * *

He held her but his mind raced. _The second what?_ He wanted to know what she was trying to say, didn't want to miss an opening, so he pulled them apart and said, "What's the second?" _The second time he'd cheated? God that man was a dog…_

Alicia paused. Something in her wanted to speak – wanted to let it all fall out.

"It was the second worst day of my life."

This time Jason stared back at her, waiting for her to continue.

Alicia felt weak, physically, emotionally, and she felt like a stranger watching herself speak as she heard the words fall from her mouth:

"I… I lost someone," she said, almost under her breath and he ached feeling the pain that spread out all around her as she spoke. _Who? He wondered. A baby? A friend?_

"We don't… we shouldn't open that box," she said, trying to smile as she wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and looked to the ceiling to try keep the tears inside.

But they wouldn't stay inside, and he took her face in his hands, letting them roll down onto his fingers. "Talk to me," he said.

She sighed. She had known that at some point this would come up. Unless she could keep things physical, keep him at arms length. She thought of Finn, and how simple it was that he had just _known._

"Do you remember the shooting in the courthouse?"

"Two years ago?"

She nodded.

"I was there that day," he mused, and her eyes widened. "A few hours before, though."

"Oh." She sniffed.

"What about it?" He remembered. A witness was killed, and a lawyer. Gardner from Stern Lockhart Gardner. Stern was dead by then too. " _That firm's cursed,"_ his buddies had joked, buddies who'd played basketball with Gardner a few times. The death had made a lot of waves among his employers, a big scramble for business before the guy was cold. He'd thought that pretty gauche.

She didn't speak.

"Oh right, you used to work for…" he trailed off and suddenly the lens clicked into focus, and her emails that had been all over the news squared with the rumors that he'd heard when he'd dug into her background before taking this job… "Oh. Oh, I see," he said.

He looked searchingly into her eyes. The rumors, the emails, they'd all suggested something much more casual than the wide-eyed and trembling woman in front of him seemed to imply.

"We weren't… it was over by then, but I, but we… I don't know."

"Come here," he shuffled on the sofa, had her lay down with her head in his lap, thinking that if she couldn't see his face then she'd feel freer to talk.

"I'd known him for twenty years."

He raised his eyebrows, reactions relaxed in the knowledge that she couldn't see. He stroked her hair, felt her fragile little body rigid against him.

"We met at law school. We were just kids, then, really, and we had all these… plans."

Jason waited.

"We shouldn't go into this now," she squeaked.

"If you want to tell me, I want to know. I want to know about you."

She paused. "Will…" she said his name like a prayer and her voice caught. "It was, he was…"

Silence pressed out around them.

* * *

"Were you together? At school?" Jason continued, a moment later.

"No," she said. "Not really… We, there was miscommunication, and terrible timing. We were best friends and I think we were both too scared to risk anything. We crossed some lines a few times, and it looked like things could…. but he got this… girlfriend… and I had to pretend to be happy for him. I started going out, you know, trying to prove something to myself. Then he came back after break and he'd ended it with her, but by then…"

"By then?"

"I had met Peter. And I loved him, I really did. It didn't feel like I was proving anything. But that destroyed our friendship. We didn't speak for probably fifteen years."

He let the words and the information seep in. Then, gently, "How'd you wind up working for him?"

"A chance encounter. In an elevator," she smiled.

 ** _I haven't seen you since Georgetown. / Another life ago._**

Alicia thought about how strange it was to be telling this all to a man that she was involved with, but Jason kept holding her and stroking her hair and she had never felt more open, less guarded. She didn't feel like she could stop.

"I… needed a job. That was after… everything… and well, Peter was in prison."

"Okay," Jason said.

"I couldn't… I couldn't get hired. My name, his name, it…"

Jason nodded. She couldn't see him but she felt it.

"But Will… he knew me before everything. He didn't see me as an extension, you know, he… we'd sat through constitutional law together, we'd stashed whiskey in our favorite part of the library. He knew me with me own name."

She stared straight ahead.

"I took that job in the middle of everything."

"What is 'everything?'" She'd used that phrase a few times and he wanted to hear her version, her memories.

"What is everything? My husband deciding I wasn't enough, our family wasn't enough, deciding to betray our vows, our life, sleeping with hookers who wound up on talk shows…" she said, bitter humor falling flat, as the dusky room darkened slowly around them.

"I was hollow then, just kind of empty. If I didn't have my kids…"

He wasn't sure he wanted the second half of that sentence, but he was glad that they were talking about this, even if the path here had been winding.

"But Will knew me before, and he knew me during, and he knew me… well, he was my after. He was my after."

Jason sighed. It was a lot to process. He felt compassion, envy, confusion.

She could feel it too.

"Shall we stop talking about this?" she offered, timid.

He lifted her hand and kissed it.

"How did it start?" he said, in lieu of an answer.

Her body tensed. "Just, whatever you feel comfortable with," he said. She relaxed.

"I think that… I think something was there from pretty early on."

 ** _\- I like myself around you Alicia, I don't like myself around a lot of people -_**

 ** _\- We always have options, Alicia. I'm just saying. -_**

"But Peter… my children… I… It didn't start until…" She tensed again. Then she tried suddenly to get up but he held her, gently, in place on his lap.

Wordlessly, she caved, relaxing back onto him.

"I found something out. About Peter. A different…"

"A woman?"

"Yes."

 ** _\- Lila? -_**

In her mind she saw them in a hotel room, her boots at the foot of the bed, the image that she had had in her head for the past five years.

"That was when it started."

 **- _What if we were to suddenly have good timing, just for an hour? What would that look like? / I think that… would look like an exceptional moment -_**

Jason seethed thinking of her so hurt, so ravaged by betrayal. He had so many questions that he dare not let past his lips.

Neither spoke, and Alicia felt an old familiar numbness creeping through her, hated when her mind went to these places, tried so hard never to let this happen. She desperately wanted a glass of tequila to hold in her trembling hands. But she was no longer angry at Jason for asking.

"How did it end?"

"I ran."

 **- _I can't, it's too much, I'm sorry. -_**

"Several times," she continued, "because when it ended, it started again. And then I ran. Again. " She was staggered by her candor, hadn't realized how clear this had been until now, really.

 ** _\- When this night is over, we talk. / We can't. -_**

This was the information Jason had been waiting for. He held on to her more tightly, as if trying to prevent her from doing that – running - right then and there.

"And so you weren't together when… when he…"

"No," she said, voice cracking.

 ** _\- I took you in. No one wanted you. I hired you. I pushed for you. -_**

 ** _\- But you're the better lawyer / I am, aren't I? / And the more humble. -_**

"And… how did you… find out about the uh… the courthouse?"

The numbness seeped further out into her limbs and her head felt dizzy as she remembered Eli's pitiful eyes - **_there's a call for you, you have to take it_ -** remembered Kalinda's quivering voice - _**Will's been shot…** -_

She remembered only fragments of that day like shards of a smashed mirror, remembered the blackening blood on the courtroom floor as her high heels echoed on the marble… it was easier to remember the scenes than the hurt, the hurt that had driven her into bed and made her feel like she could never get out of it.

She wondered if she would have a nightmare tonight.

"A colleague called me. Our old investigator, actually."

She wondered if she should tell him about the voicemail.

 ** _\- Alicia. Hold– hold on, your honor. I'll call you back. -_**

Or about how the shooting was what had changed everything between Peter and her; about how each and every day for the past two years she had regretted that she had allowed Will only in his death to finally drive her away from Peter…

 ** _\- When I cheated it didn't mean anything. / Well then that was a waste, because when I cheated it did! -_**

Or about how when she had slept with John, the first time she had been with anyone since Will died, she felt like she was cheating on a man who had been dead for a year…

Some other time.

"I'm sorry," he breathed.

"Thank you." She sighed, hard. "But I, when we… I wasn't damaged, with him. Or paranoid. I trusted him." _I loved him_ , she thought, _and I miss him every day._

 ** _\- This is the happiest I've ever been -_**

Jason nodded. He had needed to hear that.

 _How are you still standing?_ He thought.

* * *

She turned her face up to kiss him and he held her so still as his mouth found hers. It was achingly slow and intimate, just like their first real kiss in Alicia's home office, and the first time they made love, in the darkness of LAL.

The hairs on his neck stood up as their tongues slowly slid together. Shivers ran down her spine at the intensity of the connection that she felt. Against his will and beyond his control, he quickly stiffened, and she put her hand on his groin, grateful to take this in a more comfortable and familiar direction.

He groaned, and steeled himself as he picked her hand up from him, holding it instead.

"What's wrong?" she said, reaching down with her other hand.

"Not now…" he sighed. It took everything he had, but it was important to him. This was not purely physical, not for him, and not for her either, he knew.

He didn't know whether she felt drawn to him after having confided in him – grateful that he had listened, or whether she was trying to push out the pain with some physical comfort. Either way, from him, sex was neither a reward nor a replacement.

She narrowed her eyes, fleeting, confused. Had she said too much? Repelled him with her brokenness and pain?

"We're... I am so glad we talked, Alicia." He said, but she recoiled, stung. He saw it flash over her face as she tried again to stand up.

"Hey, hey," he said, grabbing her arm at the elbow. "Don't get defensive. Come here," he smiled, lying back on the sofa and patting the space next to him.

She hesitated.

"For god's sake, Alicia."

She stared into his face. Then she looked down, and moved back to the couch, lying with him.

"We're doing _this_ now, ok? We're gonna lie here together." He held her, tight, so tight, empathy and admiration both bursting in his chest.

"Was that… too much?" She asked, meek. She felt ashamed of what she had said, of how much she had shared, and she felt her cheeks burn with remorse.

"No, sweetie," he said, firm. "Of _course_ not. I hope that was just the beginning. I'm not going anywhere," he said, and she knew that he didn't just mean tonight.

They lay together on the couch for a long time, silent in unquestioned ease. Jason knew that some new threshold had been crossed, some new door carved through the walls of her fortress. He hoped she felt it too.

"I hit him once," she said, out of the blue, words tumbling into the dark room.

"What?" He was taken aback by the non sequitur.

"Peter. After he resigned as SA, after a press conference. Backstage." She almost laughed, exhausted, relieved, and delirious.

"Now _that_ would have been a front page for the Sun Times…" he grinned. He pushed his fingers into her hair and rubbed her head. She purred and relaxed against him, feeling so cared for.

As he held her he thought about what he would do to Peter in an imaginary world and how good it would feel. He cracked his neck, and his left fist clenched fleetingly at the fantasy.

But he contented himself with the expansive warmth of offering her comfort, offering her care, in this moment.


	8. END, AFTER

"Diane…?" she asked, voice low and head tilted. The sound and the pain both flashed at once and she gasped and shivered and clutched at her face…

As she walked back like steel through the labyrinth of hallways she heard a voice.

"Alicia?" Peter said. "Are you alright?" he asked, taking in the red eyes and red cheek and she felt bile in her throat remembering how he had asked her that question once before, on this same spot, and that then, her hand had found _his_ cheek….

She stared back at him, red rage smoldering behind the cool dark of her glare.

"Have you signed everything?" she said, voice level, practiced.

"I… not yet but…"

"Then no. I'm not alright." She said. Peter swallowed and looked back at her, wondering what had caused the tears he could see she was choking down. Was it him? "Sign them, have them messengered to my apartment, and then we'll talk," she said, and she left him.

She didn't know where to go, (couldn't go to work,) sat in her car until her head ached from the dim yellow light and diesel air of the underground parking garage.

She dialed him again, rang through to his voicemail, and she was so angry she imagined hurling her phone to the concrete (though she never would, still couldn't believe she once had smashed china, but the same rage trembled through her now).

She turned the key in the ignition, felt the knot of hunger in her stomach – only a coffee, this morning – felt the ache of it soothe her.

She parked at home, and walked. Walked, and walked, and walked, waiting for her phone to ring or for an appropriate drinking hour to roll around. She sent him only one more text, paying in dignity for the comfort she so needed. It went ignored.

At 4.30pm, when she felt too sick to keep walking – could have been hunger, exhaustion, rejection, she didn't know – she smiled vacantly at her doorman and rode up to 9.

Outside her front door, she composed himself, just in case. She hoped Jason would be waiting for her, lurking in the shadows, hiding, shifty, but she checked every room and there weren't even any ghosts to keep her company.

She couldn't call again, that would be desperate.

She took the heavy glass bottle into her shaking hands, and poured out a generous measure to make them stop.

 _Doorbell._

She started. Really? Now? She was excited, but angry still, and she swallowed hard, cotton in her mouth, and slipped into her heels before opening the door.

The delivery man wore a brown cap and jacket.

"Mrs Florrick?"

"Yes."

"From the Governor's office."

"Thank you," she said, barely a squeak, her arms and legs weak now and her head filled with air as she took the document-sized envelope marked URGENT, CONFIDENTIAL.

On the kitchen island, she pulled out the papers. Atop the stack, on letterhead, his curled cursive read, "I promised I wouldn't fight. For everything, I'm sorry. Yours always, P."

Beneath, the signatures. His, hers, the lawyer's. She drew in a sharp breath – it sounded like shock, fear, distress, and it was all of those things and more, and she looked at the ink and thought about everything, thought about Peter's coat wrapped around her 23 year old shoulders when she thought that this was exactly what love meant. She thought about podiums, humiliations, tears and disbelief, but also of romance, understanding, little kindnesses, laughter, knowing glances, the comfort in the warmth of him, his strangely unconventional but unconditional love.

Ink. She stared until the words blurred, poured the tequila down her throat, ate some almonds when it flamed against her empty stomach.

Another tequila.

She left a different man another voicemail, emboldened now, uncaring. She had nothing to lose, she felt, and all of her men had abandoned her in one way or another, anyway. Besides, he had responded well once before to her hardballing.

"Jason," she said into her phone, trying to not let her consonants soften or her words run into another. "I don't know where you are, and I don't know what you're trying to do. If you're trying to moderate my expectations, don't worry, they're moderated. I'm not expecting anything beyond the courtesy of some communication. If that's not too much to ask, call me, this evening, okay?"

She hung up, hovered a finger over the voicemail button (two years later, that six second message was still saved. She decided against it, surprised by her resolve.)

She sat down, on the kitchen floor, felt profoundly alone in the apartment, its silence, its emptiness taunting her, taunting her with the memories of the past seven years. She remembered the day she signed the lease, thinking _This is going to be ok, I can do this,_ over and over hoping she would soon believe it. She remembered then almost trying to back out, before Will bailed her out, hired her, (or in his burning words that she had never forgotten, "I took you in, no one wanted you," and she remembered his snarl and his hate and she shook her head).

She remembered coming back here after burying him, remembered coming home and drinking alone to wash away the bitterness of having to choke down her grief, having to stand there at the funeral and pretend that she was aching no more than was anybody else there; pretend that this man had not adored her (loved, she now knew, though she had guessed, hoped, at the time) and made her happier than she had ever been.

She remembered feeling like she was cheating on a dead man when in this house one year later, she allowed her campaign manager to touch her and lie with her as nobody had since Will was taken from her.

She laughed at the image of herself now, crosslegged on the floor, still in her black suit, unwilling to take it off, like that would be conceding something, somehow.

"Pathetic," she spat into the air.

 _Doorbell._

She tried not to feel excited this time, tried to expect Peter, or Eli, or Grace, perhaps having forgotten something she needed before spending the night with her dad. Hell, perhaps it was Diane… She didn't put her heels back on, barely straightened her skirt.

She opened the door and felt his presence like a slap - no, that felt different, she now knew, like a punch…

"What the hell?" she said, both cool and raging. They were the only words she could find, and she stood with her body guarding her home.

He didn't think she could be that angry at him, assumed instead it was displaced fury at, well, everything… He'd watched the press conference, he'd seen the E! gossip hosts laughing onscreen as he had waited in line to buy a sandwich.

"Surely even a Saint can only handle so much," the blonde woman laughed. "I'm beginning to think she's less pious, more pushover!" she crowed.

The second anchor, a man with slicked back dark hair replied, "I don't know. I think she hates him. I mean, look at her face!" he giggled. "I just hope baby girl is getting something out of all this, and I sure hope she's got herself a poolboy!"

The woman on screen had laughed, faux scandalized, as had the woman in line in front of him. Jason had raised his eyebrows and left the store.

Now, he assumed she felt humiliated, angry about the day and the press and the whole goddamn thing probably. He'd let her vent and roil.

He didn't know that she didn't feel humiliated by Peter, couldn't, really, anymore, but that she felt humiliated by _him_ , by his temporary disappearance, by his _rejection_ (and she wasn't good with rejection, but wasn't that understandable? She thought when she reasoned with herself).

"I'm sorry," Jason said. "I needed to… think."

She stared back, glacial.

"What about what I needed?" she asked, thinking that she didn't sound much like herself, so demanding, so blunt, but hell, she thought, she had already made herself so very vulnerable to him – the things she had said, "I want you," "just wait for me"; and the things she had done, reaching for his length beneath a bar table for Christ's sake – she had never _been_ so vulnerable, so honest, and for him to just ignore that, ignore her?

"I can see that you're upset," he said, trying.

He too was upset, he too was angry, actually, though he didn't dare say it, didn't dare say that he had felt so strung along by her, _used_ almost; felt not quite enough; felt like she had just wanted him to want her while offering him nothing in return, no gesture, no commitment.

"Can I come in?" he said, to her silence, and for a gratuitous moment she stared at him, still blocking the door, and then she realized she didn't even know why he was here (to stay the night? To end it?) and she stepped aside.

"Do you want something to drink?" she asked, voice soft, now, in her anxiety.

"I um… sure," he said, noticing the glass on the floor and not mentioning it. "Whatever you're drinking."

As she turned her back, she smiled and allowed herself a brief flutter of hope. It dampened for a moment the scorching flames of anger and fear that torched in her chest, the burning caused by everything and by nothing.

"I'm sorry I disappeared for a minute," he said.

 _It wasn't a minute,_ she thought, but she couldn't allow him to know how desperate she'd felt, how lonely. She couldn't admit it to herself. Instead she nodded.

"It's okay, I get it. I know I put you through a lot," she said, voice tiny.

 _Do you?_ He wondered. He had bought a plane ticket, was going to go stay for a week with a buddy in Atlanta, clear his head. Realized she'd probably read it the wrong way, though, so tore up the paper as he had said "Damn it," to himself. _You_ don't _know how much you've put me through,_ he thought. But instead, he nodded back.

"So… do we need to talk?" he asked, shooting down her first pour. She refilled.

"I don't know. Do we?" she was so unsure, couldn't read him, though she usually felt so able to decode his gaze.

"I guess I just wanted tonight to be… normal," he said (though when had anything ever been normal?) "Pick up where we left off?" he said, voice rising at the end as he scanned her face.

She sighed a smile. "There's nothing I'd rather do," she whispered. Then, "come here," she said, and he realized he hadn't yet touched her, and the need to feel her burned in him now, burned in his hands and his abdomen and lower, he walked to her and kissed her so gently on the mouth, held her so still but so lightly, screwed up his eyes in focus, in tenderness.

But she pulled at his shirt, fast and wanting, and he was taken aback by her speed and how quickly this was happening but _hell,_ if anything was normal for them, this was, and her fingers bruised stingingly into him as she grabbed at his skin.

As he pushed her back against the island, her hand slid an envelope off of a small stack of papers, and he caught sight of the signatures just as her soft hand reached through his boxers and for one reason or both he said, "Oh my god," and closed his eyes hard again to kiss her.

He thought she seemed angry, almost, in how she grabbed him, and she was angry, and so was he; both of them angry at one another, and at circumstance, and at how close they had come to implosion, and at how unclear everything still was, and at this frustrating, endless need that bound them to one another…

He span her roughly around to face away from him, bent her forwards slightly, and she braced her hands against the island, didn't see the papers, wouldn't have cared.

He brusquely hiked her up skirt, and she ripped off her own jacket, heard a button pop, didn't care.

Within seconds he pushed himself into her from behind and all she could feel was him – _finally –_ finally she didn't have to think, didn't have to shake thoughts out of her mind or tamp feelings down in her chest. She was in her body now, all at once and shockingly, and she cursed _fuck_ at everything, wanting, just wanting.

Standing behind her, he held her still, left hand on her left hip, right palm pressed flat against her chest.

But his hand, in his urgency, landed higher than where he meant to plant it. Instead of against the bones between her breasts, it was two inches higher, pressed firm into where hard chest met soft throat and it shocked her and it shocked her more that she liked it, wanted more.

She put her hand over his – he hadn't realized how his uppermost finger was against her lower throat, whispered "Sorry" as he felt her fingers on his, thought she was moving his hand down. But she slid his palm higher, another two inches, so that his fingers spanned both chest and neck and his eyes widened, but he kept his hips bucking hard into her, felt the vibrations in her throat against his palm as she moaned, the sounds of her desire fueling him even more.

Nobody had ever turned him on quite like this raging, needy little Goddess.

She pressed herself into him, pushed her hips back and her throat forward, feeling a slight constriction of breath as she leaned into his hand. In her anger, in the white heat of her passion, it felt so, unbearably good.

As he fucked her, she imagined it was each of them in turn, just briefly (although she couldn't imagine Will or Peter holding her like this, wondered if they would have had she asked…) but she didn't want ghosts now, neither husbands nor lovers, she wanted to _feel_.

"More, Jason," she said, breathy.

He was moving as fast as he could, sweat prickling his chest and arms and moistening his head.

He tried to keep up with the fury of her want (or just her fury?) and she cried out, it was a little too hard, a little too deep; it was both too much and nowhere near enough.

" _More_ ," she said, frustrated, and he felt angry that even right now when he _knew_ he was flooding her with ecstasy, _knew_ how capable a man he was at meeting her needs (physical at least), she would say something that made him feel not enough…

He gritted his teeth and moved harder, somehow, hips crashing so fiercely into her body that he thought he would break her, and she moaned so loudly now he thought about upstairs, but he didn't care, he needed her to come as much as he needed to come himself, and blindly he held her and fucked her until he felt her whole body tense, felt her shake violently as she smashed into shards, vision gone, and she felt the daggers of bliss slice through each part of her body, his palm still on her throat.

 _I thought so,_ he mused silently, allowing her to ride out her waves. _I thought I could make you shake and whimper and come so hard I have to hold you up._

Then he slid his hand back down to where he had all along intended it to be, between her breasts, and in a few short seconds he plummeted too, convulsing with pleasure that was half pain, and almost collapsing onto her (she braced for the both of them) as he was gripped with an unbearable intensity, physical and emotional, and he just held her and breathed her and tried to catch his breath.

After some silent moments, she pulled apart and turned to face him, a little smile curling her lips.

Stubborn even now, she stood and waited for him to close the few inches between their bodies and place a delicate kiss on her cheek. She smiled wider now.

He moved his lips over hers and pushed both hands into her hair, pulling gently until she groaned. He had no words, now, instead he lifted her, took them to the bedroom, peeled every lingering piece of clothing from both her body and his own, and then, still silent, got them both under the covers, pulled her to lie on his chest, and wrapped his arms around her little body and sighed at the exquisite joy of it all.

* * *

 **A week later:**

"So when can I expect you to want to pack up and leave?" she said, surprising herself, it came out more acidic than she intended, she aimed for a wry joke, gallows humor, but it wasn't…

He just looked at her and raised his eyebrows. Tried to smile, uncertain, unsure.

"I uh… I don't know" he said, unwilling to concede. He had only been being honest.

She stared back at him, cool and blank. Although it wasn't on her face (and god knows she could control her face), she felt remorse for the poison she'd just poured over their morning. Felt embarrassed as she stood wearing only his t-shirt. But she felt defensive, too, entitled to some loyalty, some commitment. She was sick of feeling _not enough._

* * *

 **Two weeks later:**

"A week on Monday is Memorial Day. Wanna do something?" She said, folding up their empty pizza box late one Friday night.

"Sure," he said. It seemed obvious to him that they would spend it together, as they did nearly every night.

"What do you want to do?"

"I don't know," he said. "You know my thoughts about planning..."

She rolled her eyes at him, half affectionate, half confused. She thought _you look so adult, from the outside…_

 _"_ What did JD Salinger say?" he continued. "How do you know what you're going to do til you _do_ it?"

She didn't get it. Didn't get him, sometimes. She wondered if he would think differently if he had had kids. But then she wondered how well planning had ever worked out for her so far…

* * *

 **Three weeks later:**

"I'm taking you away."

"You're... what?" she asked.

"For Memorial Day. I booked us this cabin by Lake Michigan," he said holding an ipad up to show her. "It's near where I grew up, actually. Maybe we'll drive through the town."

She raised her eyebrows, in happy surprise.

"You… you made _plans?"_

"Well, as Oscar Wilde said, "spontaneity is a meticulously prepared art.""

"I can't keep up with you," she grinned, and reached her hands down into his pants.

"No ma'am. _I_ can't keep up with _you…"_ and he sighed at the feel of her and put his teeth softly to her throat.

* * *

 **Two months later:**

Occasionally, when the back of her body molded into the hard front of his as he lay spooning her while he moved inside her, she allowed her thoughts to wander, closed her eyes tight and thought of other hands on her, other lips…

The first time, she felt guilty, felt like she was cheating almost, but it happened so very rarely, she reasoned, and hey, who was to judge how she dealt with grief?

* * *

 **Four months later:**

"If you move an inch, if you make a sound, I'm going to stop. Do you understand?" he breathed. She was pinned under him, a slick of sweat over their touching skin, and her eyes widened, little black pupils swallowing her irises as her body burned with need.

He had brought her right to the edge with his skilled tongue, knew exactly how to make her body sing, and then he had stopped and she had moaned. Then he had sunk into her and she had hungrily met his thrusts and murmured, " _God_ yes, oh god."

Then, stern and severe he had grabbed her hands and instructed her to stay still, stay silent, and she breathed ragged and desperate as he moved in her, held her right on the edge, her need consuming, almost painful.

She couldn't help but to moan out in pleasure at his thrusts, but he stilled, just as he had said he would. She wanted to groan again, in frustration this time, but she did as he told her to, swallowed, silently begged him to continue.

He moved again and she couldn't _see_ with pleasure. Somehow, quiet and unmoving like this, some sensations were sharper, and others were unfamiliar and arousing in their newness. And the power play always ached her groin.

She gulped again, hard, and he knew he was getting her close, knew he would only have to angle his hips forward a little to send her to pieces, but he was enjoying this too much, watching her struggle against her instincts (to buck, to groan), in pursuit of what she ultimately wanted (this shouldn't have surprised him, though, how many times had she conquered impulses and wants for bigger goals?)

Her breathing grew hollow and shallow and as he felt his own release gathering forcefully at his core, he angled his hips and took her with him, took her plunging over the edge with him, into the searing, clenching agony of their hot, joined climax.

* * *

 **Six months later:**

"Hey big man," she said as he walked through her front door holding a bottle of red. "What's that for?"

"I was offered a full-time job."

"That's great, darling!" she said, her smile so warm and genuine that his chest ached.

"Well, the call was from Courtney Paige. It's uh, it's in Sacramento."

She bit down hard on the inside of her own mouth, tasting metal, as her hands gripped the wine glasses she'd pulled from the cabinet. She couldn't leave now; her relationship with Diane was just now north of civil (though still south of warm). Besides, Sacramento? What was there? She wasn't barred in California… Did he even want her to come?

She looked searchingly into his face, and guilt stabbed him seeing the flurry behind her eyes. He said quickly,

"I turned it down."

"You… you did? Why?"

"Because I… I'm happy Alicia. Don't look so surprised," he smiled, trying to make her do the same. "You know I don't overthink things. I wouldn't go somewhere just because I think I'm a person that likes to go places. I'm happy, here, now."

"I'm happy, here, now, too," she said.

"In fact, this might be the happiest I've ever been," he said, as if the realization had caught him off guard.

She smiled and kissed him gratefully. She didn't reciprocate his language, knew that she couldn't, not truthfully, but she did know that she was happy, deeply, meaningfully. Sure sometimes she wondered _what if_. And yes, she wondered if it would be enough, long term, whether they were right together (and she kind of thought that they weren't, sometimes; the religion? The too-youthful spirit?). But she also knew that she felt joy coming home to him, every night, seeing him when she opened her door.

And, she could concede the point about not over-thinking. She was surprised to feel okay with _waiting and seeing_ , with feeling _this is good, right now,_ and that maybe it would change soon in one way or another, maybe not. She had come to feel that planning had only hurt her, up until now. She looked back and regretted what she felt had been arrogance, the way she had said to fate "I have plans" and fate had laughed and struck back, over and over, to educate her.

The education had taught her that intimacy of all types was precious, and could so easily vanish (and it had: the pure adoration for her that her children had once felt; marital fidelity; the love she assumed would always be there waiting for her when she was ready). And she had vowed to never again see something's preciousness only through its loss.

And so she had a choice: romance, or real life. Romance: that flawless, unspoiled love that could only be so perfect because it was not real (or did not happen); or real life, the mess, the flaws, along with the good (yes he could be boyish and unpredictable, but also he was wise, interesting, fiercely loyal, giving). She learned that the _reality_ of a relationship - the mess, the bumps - could be enriching, not tarnishing. And so the choice was not a choice: there was but one option. And she held onto that option with her hands and she sighed at the exquisite joy of it all.


End file.
